


Aren't You Supposed to Be Dead?

by pots_the_giraffe



Category: Keeper of the Lost Cities Series - Shannon Messenger
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Briefly Mentioned Ghostbusters, Fluff and Angst, Ghost Thing, M/M, Mentions of Suicide, there's only a little bit of angst though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:46:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24835585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pots_the_giraffe/pseuds/pots_the_giraffe
Summary: Keefe Sencen and Tam Song were two completely different people who didn't like each other very much and only crossed paths because they had the same friends. Who would've thought that something else could happen between them?After Keefe's 'death' you would think that would be the end of their story, right? Well, in this story Keefe's death was only the beginning.
Relationships: Keefe Sencen/Tam Song
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	Aren't You Supposed to Be Dead?

Tam Song had always been considered strange and was on the sidelines of almost everything and he didn’t mind it at all, he did after all much prefer to be alone with his thoughts and music. The only time Tam was ever seen at a social event outside of school was when his twin sister, Linh Song, dragged him to some party or another, this also being the only reason he had any ‘friends’ though they were more his sister’s than his but they liked him enough; more than Tam had ever expected them to.  


Keefe Sencen had been a part of his sister’s friend group but out of all of them, Tam and Keefe seemed to be the ones who fought the most so they didn’t talk to each other often and certainly not just one-on-one conversations; so almost out of nowhere Keefe died their friend group had been distraught and Tam could remember having to comfort everyone because out of all of them he was the least affected. Even after the group of friend’s was done grieving, they all, Tam included, felt incredibly guilty because not only had Keefe died but he had killed himself and no one had suspected anything was wrong or that something had changed with his already pretty bad home life.  


Keefe Sencen had been that kid, the charming class clown who flirted with literally everyone. Tam on the other hand was the kid that sat in the back of the classroom with his hood pulled over his head and the other students only ever described him as ‘emo’ which was pretty fair in all honesty. Another big difference between Keefe and Tam was that Keefe spent almost as many afternoons in detention than he did out of it, Tam however would try to leave school as soon as possible. Tam could remember the day he had gotten the call from a girl named Sophie Foster who told him that Keefe was dead. 

_“Hello, is this… is this Linh’s broth… brother?”_ Sophie had said, her voice shaking and cracking throughout the question and Tam could tell that she had been, and still was, crying.  


_“Yes, why? Did something happen?”_ He had asked like it wasn't obvious that something had happened.  


_“Yeah…” Deep breath, “Keefe… he’s… gone.”_  


_“What do you mean gone?”_ Tam had asked even though he had a suspicion as to what Sophie was getting at and he didn’t like it, not one bit.  


_“He’s dead, Tam. Just like that, one minute alive and just gone the next.”_ Sophie sobbed into the phone.  


_“What happened? He wasn’t diagnosed with anything, was he? He always seemed perfectly fine.”_ He had tried rationalizing it as if it would bring Keefe back to life because people who were healthy and good people didn’t have bad things happen to them, right? That’s what everyone was always taught at least, “If you’re a nice person, good things will come to you” and karma and whatnot.  


_“No he… he did it... himself.”_ Tam could understand why Sophie was having trouble with her wording because well telling your friend’s twin brother that you’re kinda friends with, that a guy he didn’t really like all that much was dead and that he had killed himself was more than just awkward.  


And Tam’s first response was, being the idiot he was, _“How’d he do it?”_ And for the record he did immediately regret it, _“Oh my God, do not answer that. Do you know why?”_ And almost as an afterthought he added, _“Also why are you calling me?”_  


_“Yeah… I’m not going to answer that… right now. As far as I know, the only thing he wrote in his note was that I was told immediately and that I then told you. And God… what kind of last wish is that? Do you know why he specifically requested you? Or well actually he requested ‘the more annoying and broody Song twin’.”_ After that Tam didn’t know what to say so he and Sophie shared an awkward laugh that was more hollow than anything.  


_“Okay… well… I guess I’m going to go tell Linh, if that’s alright?”_  


_“Oh yeah, of course, he just wanted you to be one of the first people to know. Bye.”_ Sophie then hung up and left Tam to his thoughts.  


Tam could recall sitting and staring at a wall with a blank face for far longer than he should have for someone who found out someone he barely knew and could barely call a friend had killed himself. That night had been emotionally taxing, he did have to tell Linh about Keefe's death but despite her balling for almost an hour, Tam had convinced her that Keefe would've wanted her to have fun, or at least he hoped he would, he didn't know the kid very well, after all but he didn't say this to Linh.

When Tam found himself staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom while his parents were out on a date and Linh was partying, one he had convinced her not to drag him to, he was only slightly surprised to find himself once again thinking about Keefe, something that happened a lot recently. Three months had passed since Keefe’s death and still no one knew what had broken Keefe Sencen, whom Tam had previously thought unbreakable, except maybe his father though he wouldn’t mention it. In fact the only thing Keefe’s father had said about was, “How dare he make me look like such a terrible father.” Which spoke for itself on its own.  


To drown out his own depressing thoughts about Keefe’s death, he had still yet to be told about how he had done which was understandable really, Tam plugged in his headphones and tried to cheer himself up by playing a random playlist which turned out to be a collection of Pop songs, far from his what he would usually would listen to but it worked.

Three hours and two completed homework assignments later and Tam was still listening to dumb Pop songs while laying on his bed. That is until the song Our Song by Taylor Swift came on and afterward it left him feeling oddly sad and so he decided to turn his music off all together and decided that he would question his odd feelings another day.  


After showering, brushing his teeth, checking in on Linh who was still partying, he turned the lights off to his bedroom and laid down in his to think about odd stuff for an hour or two. Right before drifting off to sleep Tam felt oddly like someone was watching him but he just put it down to his imagination. 

The next night he felt the same feeling again but once again ignored it and decided it was nothing.

After feeling the same thing every night for the rest of the week, Tam determined that he was either crazy or someone was actually watching him sleep. What Tam was going to do with this knowledge however, he had no clue, and so he decided that if it kept happening again he was going to do something about it.

One night turned to two which turned five and then turned into nearly three weeks total because Tam was procrastinating doing something because all the person was doing was watching him sleep which was harmless and he had already gotten up with a bat once and swung it around his room feeling equally relieved and shocked when he didn’t hit anything. He’d also gone to bed with a flashlight and had at random intervals turned it on to look around his room but once again there was nothing so either the person watching him was incredibly quick and agile or a ghost was watching him and what was he going to do about a ghost? Call in some Ghostbusters or some Paranormal Exterminators, which were a real thing he had looked it up.  


The next night Tam decided that maybe Satan himself had taken a special interest in Tam, which wasn’t all that surprising, and was maybe looking for a way to get Tam’s soul, now that would shock Tam because if Satan wanted a soul why would he _choose_ Tam’s. Taking this into consideration, Tam decided to try and strike up a conversation with Maybe Satan because he obviously had a death wish.  


"Soooo, Possible Demon here to take my soul, why do you keep, you know, watching me sleep?” Okay, in hindsight that might not have been the best conversation starter when he was dealing with a Possible Demon but to be fair he wasn’t _really_ expecting a response.  


It took you _this_ long to say anything? And people would call _me_ stupid?” Came a response from somewhere within his room.  
Like a normal person, Tam screamed but then he felt a hand cover his mouth and he was about to bite it when whatever it was that was talking to him removed the hand.  


"Who are you and what are you doing in my room?!” Tam whisper shouted in the direction he thought the voice was coming from.  


"Aw, so you don’t recognize me from just my voice? And I thought we were best friends? Also if I told you what I was doing here that would give away who I am.” Tam could practically hear the pout the other person was making.  


"And who are you?” Tam asked, now a little miffed.  


"I’ll give you some clues and we can play the guessing game, wouldn’t that be fun?!”  


Tam decided that he could’ve probably gotten a worse demon to have come and reap his soul so he decided to do what he was asked before he angered the demon and because how bad could the guessing game be? Well bad, Tam could speak from experience but it was (mostly) better than torture.  


"Okay fine, I’ll play.”  


"Yay! Okay, here are your clues: we knew each other, I’m dead, and I don’t think you liked me very much.” On the last clue, the person (Tam had determined that he most likely didn’t know any demons who had died) sounded oddly sad.  


Tam thought about the clues and could only come up with three people he knew that died and that he didn’t like very much; this one aunt that had called Linh weird once for wanting a mercat when she was little, his aunt’s daughter who was only a couple of years older than the twins that had agreed with her mother, and Keefe Sencen. The voice, very distinctly male, couldn’t belong to either of his family members because they were still females despite how often Tam would compare them to male gorillas, so it was either obviously Keefe, a demon wanting to mess with him before taking his soul, or a really cruel prank.  


"Keefe?” Tam practically whispered, fully expecting the lights to turn on to reveal one of the bullies from his school standing there with a sign stating how stupid he was, what he was not expecting however, was for the voice to whisper back a quiet, “Yes.”  


“How am I supposed to know this isn’t just some kind of dumb joke or that _you're_ not here to take my soul?” Tam asked wanting to know sooner rather than later before his already rising hopes could raise even more.  


“Uhhh… what do you want me to do to prove that I’m well, me?”  


“It’s rather obvious, isn’t it? Just tell me one thing that only I would know about you.”  


That’s a tad bit difficult since we didn’t spend much time togth- oh… nevermind. Sophie and you were the only people specifically mentioned in my, um,” The person claiming to be Keefe cleared his throat here, “in my note.”  


“It’s… it is you” Tam’s throat was unusually choked up as a wave of emotions hit him like a train, “How?”  


“Well, Satan took a particular liking to me after watching a quick recap of my life and decided that he would give me this weird new body, I’m like half ghost and half human. I can choose when people see me and when my body is solid or not. It’s really awesome and also the reason as to why you never noticed me but could feel me watching you.”  


"Why would Satan do that? Isn’t that like against the rules or something?” Tam decided to leave the larger issue about the fact that his dead sorta friend was talking to him about Satan and decided to think about setting up an appointment with a therapist the next day.  


Well he kinda felt bad and decided to let me live the rest of my life like this until I decided to return fully to being dead and he’s Satan, do you think he follows rules? Of course not!”  


“So you had some unfinished business or whatever and Satan himself took pity on you?” After Keefe’s quiet murmur of a ‘pretty much’, Tam continued, “Then why have you been sleep stalking me?”  


“Not just when you’re sleeping, I do it during the day too but it’s just not as noticeable then, I’ve also been waiting for you to say something about it for like a month. And as for why, I think I’d like to sit down for this part.”  


Tam gave a quick, “Sure.”And he could feel Keefe sit down next to him and could feel the flutter of Keefe’s shirt against the tiny bit of skin revealed where his shirt had lifted it up on his hip. With the closeness and the indistinct light coming from his alarm clock, he could see Keefe better now and it was undeniable that it was him especially now that Tam could see his unmistakable hair, eyes, and batman shirt. Tam could feel that something was slightly off though because Keefe seemed to have airiness to him that wasn’t there before but for being half dead (Tam still wasn’t exactly sure what Keefe was) he looked pretty good.  


When Keefe reached over to grab one of Tam’s hands that was closest to him, Tam could feel his heartbeat pick up and he wasn’t exactly sure why.  


“I think… I…” Keefe took a deep breath, “I think I may like you. And wow shocker, I know but that’s not all, I think I _like-like_ you, like more than a friend but different from the way I like ice cream, you get me? Probably not, I mean I did just compare you to ice cream which might I add isn’t a terrible thing to be compared to-,” Tam in an attempt to cut off Keefe’s rambling had placed his hand over Keefe’s mouth similarly to the way Keefe had done earlier.  


“I don’t know what’s really happening and I’m sort of confused right now but I can say that I may like you the same way you like me.” Tam then removed his hand and wiped the saliva off his hand because Keefe had goddamned licked him.  


Keefe grinning now, laced their fingers together, leaned forward to use the other hand to tuck a stray piece of Tam’s hair behind his ear, and then rested his forehead on Tam’s. After sharing a couple of breaths and each feeling like their chests were about to explode Keefe said, “I never thought I was going to breath again and yet here I am. I also never thought I was ever going to hold your hand but look at us! I think tonight is a very night for doing stuff I never thought I was going to do. Here goes two more: will you, Tam Song, be my boyfriend?” Keefe was staring very intently into Tam’s eyes while he watched as Tam nodded, “Wow, tonight is going even better than I could have probably ever imagined, so I guess the other thing is: could I kiss you?”  


Tam gave a slight nod, which was practically all he could do with how nervous he was. Keefe leaned in the rest of the way to give Tam a gentle, soft kiss that left them both grinning afterward.  


“Does this mean I get to tell people I’m dating a ghost?”


End file.
